Two weeks to slow the spread. We’re all in this together. It’s just two weeks. It’s just a mask. I wear my mask because I care. Wear it for someone’s grandma. Real patriots wear a mask. Masking doesn’t harm anyone. Follow the science. Don’t question us. If you question us, you are ignorant. Bigoted. Racist. Don’t worry, this is temporary and limited. We will give these freedoms back. If everyone just complies, we will be able to give you your freedom. This is for your safety. Safety is more important than liberty. Follow the propaganda. The CDC has authority in an emergency. The Constitution can be suspended in an emergency. We know you have the right to assemble, to worship, to travel, to work, to petition your government, but, but, but…this is an emergency! This is for your own good. It’s just two weeks….
Is it? Was it? How did the mask become a leftist symbol, or worse, their political tool? Was this ever about your safety, or was this about control? Perhaps it was the biggest scam of all time to usher in a radical new normal, a Trojan horse for an ideology that loathes tradition and normalcy.
The war cry of leftist political activists begins with pleas for tolerance and ends with an authoritarian requirement for complete assimilation or else. If you dare to disagree, you will become the target of their wrath, you’ll be slandered, maligned, and canceled. The left despises normal. They hate your traditional education, patriotism, borders, families, fuels, and freedoms.
Enter Covid. Enter fear, the perfect vessel for these radical politicians to relentlessly peddle their propaganda in the name of safety. A chance for them to shame you for your traditional values. How dare you have a family dinner! A chance to attack and villainize normalcy. A chance to make their cold, detached, unfeeling, equitable dystopia the “new normal.” A chance to fundamentally transform America by the decree of an executive pen. A global pandemic became a political battle for the soul of our nation.
This week the ruling from a federal judge in Florida confirmed that we were right. As I have said for years, these “emergency” policies were not only ineffective, they were also unconstitutional. They had no payoff in mortality and were completely reckless, leaving a wake of devastation the scale of which may never be calculable. And the uproarious hissy fit of the left as they are stripped of their power to control you with their most sacred symbol shows that this was always about one thing. Power. Cover your face. Hide your smile. Zoom your life away. The government is your savior. Obey. Control. The left doesn’t have answers to crime and homelessness. They don’t have solutions to the abysmal student performance and budget crisis in our education systems. Their policies fail over and over again. And so they tried to create a society where you ask the government for permission to be free, where they force their ideals on you and your children, and cling fervently to the filthy symbol of their control.
The left fears a free people united in their love for humanity and liberty. A People like that are ungovernable. A people like that founded this nation of free thinkers and world changers. A people like that, secure in the knowledge that liberty is granted by God, not governments, are a threat to the leftist machine. We questioned them and challenged them and took them to court. And they are losing fight after fight. The Osha vaccine mandate, illegal. Eviction moratorium, illegal. The California ban on indoor church services, illegal. CDC mask mandate on public transportation, illegal. They never had the authority to do ANY of this. And we must never let them get away with it again.
Do not be fooled. They will try this again. But we can take hope and stand in the confidence of each victory for the old normal. Create community, hold on to your values, and be happy that you are immune to the propaganda. And remember those timeless words of Benjamin Franklin, “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
Jamie Allard is an Anchorage Assembly member representing Chugiak and Eagle River.